“Ashes of Love” was co-written by Jack Anglin, Jim Anglin, and Johnny Wright, and first recorded by Johnnie and Jack (Johnnie Wright and Jack Anglin) and the Tennessee Mountain Boys in 1951. The song was released as part of the duo’s RCA Victor catalog and quickly became one of the canonical country-music heartbreak songs of the early 1950s, with the title’s “ashes of love” image becoming one of the most-quoted phrases in the genre.
The Anglin family connection runs through the song’s writing credits: Jack Anglin was Johnnie Wright’s brother-in-law (Wright was married to Anglin’s sister Kitty Wells, who would go on to her own legendary country-music career), and the three writers collaborated on a number of pieces during the early Johnnie and Jack period. Jim Anglin was Jack’s brother and also a songwriter in the family circle. The song’s writer credit thus reflects a particularly tight-knit Tennessee country-music writing partnership.
“Ashes of Love” crossed firmly into the bluegrass repertoire through Flatt and Scruggs and many subsequent acts. The song has been recorded by Kitty Wells with Johnnie Wright, the Hot Mud Family, Jim and Jesse, Hugh and Katy Moffatt, and countless others. It remains one of the most reliable mid-1950s country-bluegrass heartbreak pieces at jam sessions where pickers want a song with the classic ashes-of-burnt-down-love narrative arc.
